Season Overview

The ESL AU & NZ Championship, the region’s premier esports league, returns in 2018 with two seasons of premier esports action from your favourite titles. Returning with the AU&NZ mainstay, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive sees it's sixth season kick off alongside a newcomer to the Championship. Due to popular demand, we are happy to announce that Dota 2 will also feature throughout both seasons in 2018.

Think you’re the best? This is your chance to prove it - join us on our mission to determine who really are the champions of Australia & New Zealand.

Season 1 will see players compete for a total prizepool of $30,000 with the added prestige of bigger offline events than ever before!

Counter-Strike

Counter-Strike

Season 1 for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive will expand from the traditional 8 team league to a 16 team league. Teams will be seeded and split into two groups of 8 where they will compete on Wednesday and Thursday nights for 7 weeks. For the 16 teams, 14 will be invited based on regional standings with 2 slots remaining for qualification via two open qualifiers. At the end of the regular season, 4 teams from each group will advance to the offline playoffs.

Invited Teams:

Athletico Esports

Carnage Esports

Conspiracy Esports

ChiefsESC

Corvidae

Grayhound Gaming

Ground Zero Gaming

Legacy Esports

Lucky7Gaming

ex-Masterminds

ORDER

Riotous

SSU Esports

Tainted Minds

Open Qualifiers:
Two open qualifiers will be held for all teams outside of the invited 14 to show us that they deserve their place in the National Championships. Each qualifier will be run independently in a single elimination best-of-one bracket with a best-of-three final. The winner of each bracket will advance on to the online league.

Important Dates:

Open Qualifier #1: Saturday, 24th of February, 2018

Open Qualifier #2: Sunday, 25th of February, 2018

Week 1: Wednesday 7th - Thursday 8th of March, 2018

Week 2: Wednesday 14th - Thursday 15th of March, 2018

Week 3: Wednesday 21st - Thursday 22nd of March, 2018

Week 4: Wednesday 28th - Thursday 29th of March, 2018

Week 5: Wednesday 5th - Thursday 6th of April, 2018

Week 6: Wednesday 11th - Thursday 12th of April, 2018

Week 7: Wednesday 18th - Thursday 19th of April, 2018

Season Finals: June, 2018

Dota 2

Dota 2

Following our teaser announcement at the ESL Stage at PAX Arena 2017, we’re incredibly excited to announce Dota2 as an official title for the ESL AU & NZ Championship 2018 season. The hugely popular, yet underground esport in our region will be brought to the forefront with teams being able to compete in 4 Open cups to show us their abilities starting March 5. From there the top two teams from each cup will advance to the online playoffs each vying for one of four placings at the Offline Finals and a sweet chunk of that $10,000 prizepool.